


Flesh & Flora

by tysmiha



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes (1984 TV), Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Angst, Fatally Goopy Romance, Hanahaki Disease, M/M, No Mary Morstan, Not Actually Unrequited Love, POV Alternating, Post-Reichenbach, Reflections on Mortality, Suicide mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-27
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-17 23:54:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,790
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29725155
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tysmiha/pseuds/tysmiha
Summary: It may be more of the good doctor’s purview, but Sherlock Holmes can appreciate the odd rare medical curiosity. The roses filling his lungs are certainly curious. It’s unfortunate that he won’t live long enough to learn much.Watson, he thinks, will be fine.
Relationships: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson
Comments: 18
Kudos: 66





	1. Chapter 1

> _"Our highest assurance of the goodness of Providence seems to me to rest in the flowers; it is only goodness which gives extras. And so I say again, we have much to hope from the flowers."_ \- The Naval Treaty

As much as it was Sherlock Holmes’s specialty to know things -- sweepingly extensive, broadly ranging things, the pattern of which could never be identified because the pattern was simply whatever needed to be known at the time of relevance -- it was every bit as much his specialty to _not_ know other things. This, too, held a most unidentifiable pattern, spanning from the understandably obscure to the most common knowledge, which others might call common sense. 

As he stood outside of his apartment on Baker Street, holding a single green leaf between his fingers, he found himself drawing a bit from both categories. Here was what he knew: the leaf was dull green with a leathery, satin texture, a serrated margin, approximately five centimeters in length and belonging to the subspecies _Rosa Gallicanae_. What he did not know was how he’d come to pull it out of his own mouth after a particularly protracted coughing fit. His forays into medical expertise had been limited before he met his doctor, tending more toward chemistry in any case, but with Watson, he found the need to retain such knowledge quite diminished. No need to store what could be just as readily answered by someone he was rarely without. 

This deficiency, however, proved somewhat irritating when the subject of the question was himself. His cough had persisted for several days already, and he’d written it off as the onset of a typical cold, which he tended to suffer at certain times of year or after working too many cases with not enough rest. That was the excuse he’d given, anyway, when Watson cast a leery glance at him over breakfast that morning. In truth, he suspected it was neither. More pressingly, he suspected Watson thought the same.

“All right?” the doctor asked, closing the door of the flat behind him and tucking his scarf into his coat. His eyes fixed momentarily on the leaf, which Holmes immediately released to the breeze.

“Watson, I’m afraid I’ll have to send you to see the inspector alone today,” said Holmes, clearing his throat. “You have everything you need; you can fill me in this evening.”

Watson frowned. “Of course,” he said. “Where are you going?”

“I’ll see you for dinner tonight,” Holmes replied over his shoulder, already walking away.

  
  


\----------

  
  


Generally speaking, there was not much that could draw Holmes away from a case once he was set upon a line of investigation. If the problem was compelling enough, his mind focused singularly upon it, to the exclusion of any and every other thing. This new mystery, however, had decidedly superseded the one he’d left to Watson. The murdered man of his case was already dead, after all -- a crime of passion, with little risk of further victims. If he could find what he needed here in a few short hours, he thought as he knocked on the oversized door of the Barbary estate, there was plenty of time to resolve both.

“Good morning,” he said to the butler who answered, turning briefly away to cough into his arm. “I’m here to see Dr. Barbary, if he’s in.”

“Is he expecting you, sir?” the butler said with a creased brow, visibly perturbed by the hacking.

“I’m afraid not,” answered Holmes. “You can tell him it’s Sherlock Holmes. He will know me.”

“Yes, Mr. Holmes,” nodded the butler, opening the door to let him inside. “If you’ll wait here.”

Holmes offered a constricted smile, removed his hat and stood by the wall as he watched the butler disappear through another set of doors. In just moments the butler reappeared, holding one door open as Dr. Barbary himself followed him out.

“Mr. Holmes!” the doctor exclaimed, approaching with a hand extended. “To what do I owe this magnificent pleasure? I have to say, I didn’t expect to ever see you again! You couldn’t have come at a better time -- I just received the most fascinating donation from the college: a human skull nearly twice as thick as yours or mine! You’re more than welcome to take a look!”

Holmes removed his gloves, accepting the handshake with a warm grin. “Very good to see you, Dr. Barbary,” he said, “but I’m afraid I’m on rather a tight schedule this morning.”

“Of course, of course,” Barbary replied blithely, though something in his expression shifted a bit more toward concern. “Anything I can do to help, though I’m sure I can’t ever repay you for clearing my name.”

“I would consider it a great favor to have your--” Holmes began, but stopped to clear the scratching in his throat, turning away again until the coughing ceased. In his hand lay a deep red petal, wilting and slick with saliva. He shoved it hastily into his pocket. “--To have your opinion on a somewhat personal matter.”

“Yes, certainly, please,” Dr. Barbary said, his demeanor turning notably more serious as he took Holmes’s elbow and led him to his office.

Holmes dropped himself onto the settee, unwrapping the scarf from his neck and placing it on his lap, twisting the corner of it absently between his fingers.

“Can I get you anything?” Barbary offered, sitting in an armchair across from him.

“Thank you, no,” Holmes shook his head. He opened his mouth to speak, but realized suddenly that he had not really planned where to begin. Dr. Barbary had specialized in rare diseases when he was a professor at Leeds, though his interests had taken a turn for some less established scientific pursuits in recent years. Holmes wasn’t quite sure which of those things would come into greater importance here.

Barbary watched him for several moments in respectful silence before speaking himself. “Mr. Holmes,” he said, tugging pensively at his beard, “I may not be a practicing physician, but I assure you, whatever you say will never leave this room. You have my sincerest word.”

Holmes smiled tightly, nodding. “And you have my thanks,” he replied. “To tell you the truth, I don’t know how to ask what I wish to know. I’m--” 

His words were cut off by another bout, which sent him doubling over the edge of the settee, catching another red petal in his hand. He stared at it, unwilling to meet Barbary’s eyes. If he’d struggled to formulate a question about it, he expected this would do instead.

“I see,” was all the doctor said.

When Holmes looked up again, Barbary was on his feet, pouring a glass of water and bringing it to him. His eyes were far away even as he passed the glass off, clearly lost in thought. Sitting at his desk, he tented his fingers at the tip of his nose in contemplation. “I have heard of this,” he said at last, “though I confess, I have never seen it myself. Mr. Holmes--”

He stopped himself, drawing a sharp breath in preparation, but no words followed. It spoke for him well enough.

“It’s all right, Doctor,” Holmes said earnestly. “I only want information, I promise there’s no need to be sensitive.”

Dr. Barbary nodded, chewing his lip a moment before speaking again. “You are a very practical man, Mr. Holmes,” he said. “I know that my studies have... raised a few eyebrows since I abandoned medicine, but I hope you will believe me that I would not suggest something to you if I weren’t quite certain of its validity.”

“I think you’ll find my disbelief fairly suspended this morning,” replied Holmes with a dry laugh.

“Indeed,” agreed the doctor with a sympathetic laugh of his own. “In that case, I can tell you this much: I don’t know if there is a single agreed upon name for the condition; in symposiums I’ve attended, I have heard it called the flowering cough. It’s classified as both a respiratory malady and a psychological one.”

Holmes frowned. “How so?”

“It, um,” Barbary tugged again on his beard. “It’s said to be a stress-induced physical effect of unreturned affection.”

Holmes’s frown deepened. “Unreturned affection,” he echoed, unable to keep the skepticism from his voice.

“Quite so, yes. You can imagine there has not been much opportunity to study it, but all accounts share that commonality.”

He stopped, seeming to watch Holmes for some dispute. When none arose, he continued, hesitant. “It’s… quite serious, actually. There’s no known treatment or way of curtailing the growth. Once the disease gestates, the only known reversal is to resolve the source of the stress.”

“The unreturned affection,” Holmes repeated again, the meaning of the words sinking in even as he fought to repudiate them. Implausible as it seemed, the appositeness was, well. Evident, inarguable. Damning. 

“If left unresolved,” Barbary went on, “the results are… invariably fatal. The infection takes over the respiratory tract in its entirety, eventually asphyxiating the sufferer. Unpleasant,” he mused dolefully. “Most unpleasant.”

Holmes studied Dr. Barbary’s face, knowing well already that he would find none of the mockery or deception he hoped for. Sympathy, some; curiosity, moreso. And honesty, open faced and sincere. If the information was false, if Barbary was mad, it only meant there was more research to be done. Holmes had a sick feeling it was not.

“Thank you, Doctor,” he said finally, rising from the settee and clearing his throat again. With one last swig of water, he forced down a cough, praying to at least make it through the front door before facing another attack.

“I feel rather more like I should be apologizing to you than taking your thanks,” Barbary said, shaking Holmes’s hand again, looking too much like a man who’d just issued a death sentence. “I hope you’ll come back around if there’s a single way I can help.”

“You’re very generous,” said Holmes, tying his scarf around his throat and putting his hat back on. “And you’ve been a great help already. I will be most appreciative of your discretion.”

“Of course, you may rely on it,” said Barbary. “Good luck, Mr. Holmes. I hope she sees what she’s missing.”

  
  


\----------

  
  


“And that was when I noticed the water damage along the baseboard near the fireplace,” Watson said over dinner in their Baker Street sitting room that night. “The housekeeper insisted there had been a vase spilled, but the damage suggested something more than a one-time accident. I think you’ll agree when you see it-- you are coming tomorrow, aren’t you?”

Holmes pulled his gaze away from the far wall and forced himself to look at Watson. “Yes,” he said. “Yes, I believe I’ve learned everything I need to know.”

“And what all is that?” said Watson, leaning back in his chair with his glass in hand.

“Not very much--” he began, stopping to cough into his napkin. He didn’t bother confirming what came up, only folded it into the cloth and returned the napkin to his lap. “Not very much at all, I’m afraid,” he tried again, flashing what he hoped to be a reassuring smile.

Watson’s brow furrowed, but all he said was, “Better to be sure than to overlook something.”

Holmes nodded, turning his focus to the coffee he’d requested instead of a meal.

The science of such a thing was irrelevant, he supposed, if there was only one cure and he already knew what it was. It didn’t matter how it came to be, how it was physically possible. The facts were that he had a persistent cough, that this particular cough produced leaves and petals, and that for all the near fifteen years he had loved John Watson, John Watson did not love him. That such an affliction existed at all was far less of a mystery than how it had taken him so long to contract it.

He coughed once more into his napkin, a new petal joining the last, both hidden away again in a matter of seconds. He didn’t look across the table; he knew already what he would see.

“I wish you would let me look at you,” said Watson with an exasperated sigh.

“It’s only a cold, I’ve already told you,” Holmes snapped. 

“It shakes you like it might be something else,” Watson snapped back. “For heaven’s sake, what good is living with a doctor if you never let him help you?”

“My dear Watson,” Holmes replied, taking some measure to soften his tone, “you help me plenty enough as it is. I promise if there is anything you can do, you will be the first to hear about it.”

Watson sat in terse silence for a while before speaking again. “I wish you would at least eat something,” he said quietly.

Holmes said nothing, but hid a fleeting smile in his coffee cup. On better days, these were the moments he allowed himself the private satisfaction of thinking of Watson as _his_ doctor, that regardless of anything else Watson felt, he regularly demonstrated a vested interest in Holmes’s wellbeing, even when Holmes himself could not. It was and had always been a privilege to know Watson’s care and attention. On days like this one, however, that satisfaction was routinely chased with admonition. Watson offered his friendship in good faith and trust; to wish for more was ungrateful at best and vulgar at worst, and yet day after day, year after year, Holmes found himself doing just that. Most of the time it was nothing more than wallpaper in the background of his mind, all-encompassing but not imposing; other times it was the only worthwhile concept in the entirety of the universe. 

Either way, his refusal to let go of it, to leave the poor man well enough alone and focus his energy solely on his work had brought him here. The satire of it was that only just days ago he’d attempted a pact with himself to try and forget it, all of it, the dense mass in his chest that both fettered him and kept him from floating away. It wasn’t that feeling so much love for Watson was a waste of energy -- not that, never that -- but too frequently it seemed holding this secret between them dealt more damage than he could justify. The removal of it was, at least, a process that would only be unpleasant for him. It was a self-evident certainty that Watson did not love him; if that certainty had not changed at all in fifteen years, he’d decided, then of course it never would. It was hardly even the next day that he awoke with a burning throat.

His resolve had crumbled nearly instantaneously, at any rate. It was true that Watson would never love him, not quite the same way, but rewriting a decade and a half of habitual affection proved more taxing than letting it persist as wallpaper. Until now, anyway. Now, he expected, it was only a matter of time before it would quite literally consume him. If a week ago someone had asked him what stock he placed in fate--

Holmes’s thoughts were interrupted by another bout of coughing which forced him up from his chair, past Watson and his worried protestations, and into his room with the door shut soundly behind him. He coughed up two, three, four more petals and sat on the floor beside his bed, head in his hands, to catch his breath and compose himself. He braced for the inevitable gentle rapping at his door. In moments, there was Watson, predictable in all the best ways. 

“Are you all right?” he heard him ask. “Do you need anything?”

Holmes never wanted to get away from it more.

  
  


\----------

  
  


The frequency of the attacks did not increase much over the next four days, but the intensity and the results of them changed quite notably. He’d accepted their latest case and effectively turned the entire thing over to Watson for the sole purpose of keeping him occupied, to avoid him seeing the buds and blossoms he retched into his handkerchief, the increasingly reduced distance he could walk before having to stop for breath. It was dubiously banal, and Watson had raised a brow when Holmes agreed to search for the serial burglar of Galway Manor, but Holmes wagered he might care more to keep him from lethargy than to criticize his choices of diversion. 

Either way, it wouldn’t be long before Watson became too suspicious to take any instruction from him at all. Holmes had taken to skipping all meals with him, staying out later than Watson was wont to stay awake, meeting with him only briefly in the mornings to discuss the proceedings of the day and accept his notes from the day before. It was not sustainable, but then, neither was he.

He knew before he ever accepted, of course, that the burglar was their client’s daughter. She had gone, presumably, to study abroad, but it was obvious she’d never left London at all. The young man who had introduced himself as her sponsor was clearly her lover, when he abandoned her she was too ashamed to return home and fell into the opium dens, periodically resorting to burgling her mother’s jewelry box in order to support herself. Watson would doubtlessly arrive at the same conclusion in a matter of a day or two, but that was enough time for what Holmes needed to do.

Looking out from his cab at the passing dusty alleys of the outskirts of London, he attempted to sort through the rapidly multiplying thoughts crowding his mind. The facts were thus: first, he was dying. Without having sought an expert opinion, if such a thing existed, and judging only by the acceleration of his symptoms and the growth of the flowers themselves, he gave himself a week at best. Second, he had faced his mortality before, more than once, though never so reluctantly as this. It had less to do with the unexpectedness of it, despite the other occasions being indeed a bit more foreseen, and significantly more to do with the absolute, utter pointlessness. It was neither an end he’d asked for, nor an end that accomplished anything. That alone decreased the appeal considerably. And third, if he didn’t use the meager time he had before he was too strangled to act, he would forfeit his ability to choose those few circumstances of his death which he _could_ control -- namely, not leaving the good doctor with an efflorescent corpse to haul out of Baker Street.

Involving Mycroft was, as always, more of a necessity than a willing choice, or even a polite formality. But, as the nearest surviving relative, there were some matters which unavoidably called for his participation, and other matters still which called more for his permeating influence. The one consolation was that of all the people Holmes might inform of his foreordination, Mycroft was least given to displays of pity. The conversation would be grounded in pragmatism and, God willing, exceedingly brief.

Holmes stepped into Mycroft’s sitting room, removing his hat and setting it on an end table. Mycroft had, of course, gleaned that all was _not_ well the instant he laid eyes on Holmes, but to inquire further had thankfully never been in his nature.

“Brother,” he said in greeting.

Holmes opened his mouth to reply and coughed up three juvenile rosebuds into his handkerchief instead.

Mycroft’s eyes widened momentarily at the sight of them, but his expression remained otherwise blessedly neutral as he shut the door behind them and immediately poured two glasses of brandy.

“You’re leaving,” he said, after several long seconds of silence.

Holmes sipped his drink, though it burned his already raw throat. There were thorns -- only sometimes, but sometimes was enough. That part was sure to only get worse.

"I won’t sanction a suicide, you know that,” continued Mycroft.

“It’s an illness--” Holmes began.

“It’s a curable illness,” Mycroft interrupted.

Holmes frowned. He knew of it then; that should have been no great surprise. 

“No,” he said, attempting to keep the acerbity from his tone, falling just short. “Not for me.”

Mycroft watched him for a few seconds longer before rising from his seat and walking to his desk. “Where will you go?”

“Anywhere. The first place you can find outside of London where I’ll be left alone.” Holmes watched as his brother pulled a large envelope from a drawer. “If you would be so kind as to send someone along in seven days’ time to fetch me, I would be obliged.”

“Charming,” Mycroft replied. He placed the envelope on his desk. “Your papers. I believe they’re still in order from your last… departure.”

“This isn’t that,” said Holmes. 

“Indeed,” said Mycroft flatly. “I’ll leave you to sort through them. I can have a room for you in Kent by tomorrow evening.”

“Thank you,” Holmes said, exhaling as he watched Mycroft head for the door. He stopped just short of it, though, turning back slightly.

“You should put more faith in your doctor, Sherlock,” he said. “I’d say he’s earned that much.”

Holmes gave an almost imperceptible nod, and the next moment Mycroft was closing the door behind him.

It was one facet of this ordeal which Holmes had, up to now, pointedly ignored. This would be hard on Watson, but he was at least already practiced at moving on. His bereavement after Holmes’s final confrontation with the late Professor Moriarty had extended beyond the anticipated time frame, but it was unlikely a reprise would have the same effect. At least this time there would be incontrovertible proof of his demise; that was, supposedly, an aid to the grieving process. He would recover and be better for it, without the continuous trials of--

The thought was cut short, interrupted as Holmes was sent to his knees, choking and gasping, left finally with a handful of leaves, petals, a single intact flower. He stared blankly at the mass of red and green as he tried to recover his breath. 

Irrelevant as it may have been, the _how_ of it was still intriguing. That a condition might be stress induced was reasonable; that this exact source of stress, and no other, was required to produce these effects was less so. How could the brain, the body, differentiate so precisely between despair caused by unanswered devotion and, say, grief over the death of a lover? In either case, there is the matter of a broken heart, of irreparable separation from one’s desire. And how, too, was such a coalescence of flesh and flora possible to begin with? The biology of it was mystifying. But, then, that had always been Watson’s area. Maybe whatever remained of him once this had run its course would be useful to the examination of it.

Regardless, it would be over soon enough. If all went well, Holmes would be consigned to the countryside to see out his last days in relative peace, sparing Watson the grisly imposition and releasing him at last from the onerous duties of maintaining a friendship with Sherlock Holmes. Perhaps it was better for himself, too, not just Watson. Being in love had always been a contest between misery and euphoria, but somehow it had taken a decade and a half for the former to stake its claim at last. Maybe that had been the true inception of the affliction, some time before his failed attempt to cut the sentiment out entirely, waking up to find the scale tilted just so and knowing no way to right it. So it was better, he supposed, to hold onto those euphoric memories than watch them morph into bitter resentment over time.

And yet, if he’d ever been truly, genuinely happy in his life, it had to have been these past years. At Reichenbach, he’d been content to end his life with a high note for his career; here, it seemed he could do much worse than ending on a high note where his heart was concerned. It had never mattered that Watson didn’t love him. He stayed, that was enough. All that was left now was the paperwork, the letter, the goodbye. 

Holmes picked himself up, secreting the flowers into his handkerchief, and took a seat at Mycroft’s desk. Watson would forgive him, he thought as he pulled the papers from the envelope and spread them out before himself. He would forgive him if it took years or if it only took a day. He would forgive him for an indiscrete heart, if not for allowing it to bring about his own end. He would forgive him because he was John Watson. That was something Holmes was confident he’d never deserved.


	2. Chapter 2

The Galway Manor case was by no means the first one Watson had solved almost entirely on his own, though usually when Holmes challenged him to employ his methods so independently, there was still some amount of regular follow-up. Holmes had been uncommonly absent throughout the entire ordeal. Holmes had been uncommonly absent in general, really, even when he was there, standing in front of him, listening to summaries he should have asked for but strangely did not. He was occupied, Watson told himself. There was some other matter capturing his attention, and when he was ready to tell about it, he would. That had always been his way; there was never any use trying to pry information out of him when he was unwilling.

It was, however, troublingly reminiscent of the fixation which had drawn him away before his disappearance in Switzerland -- the time leading up to that, between Holmes’s discovery of Professor Moriarty’s network and the invitation he extended Watson to leave the country with him, had been some of the quietest Watson had known since they met. Dissimilar as they were, he and Holmes had still always been of the same mind on so many fronts; when Moriarty entered the picture, it was as if a wire had been severed. Holmes had taken to leaving without notice or explanation, and returning wearier than ever only to vanish again in the morning.

But this wasn’t that. For one, there was no Moriarty, there was no crime syndicate, there wasn’t even some new subject of study into which Holmes had thrown himself to the neglect of everything else, as he was prone to do. It was just a silence, impenetrable and relentless. 

And then there was the matter of that cough. Watson was used to obstinacy from him just as much as his other patients, but although Holmes had insisted he was suffering from a mere seasonal cold, they both knew that wasn’t quite true. It was his way to regularly refuse examination; any suggestion of treatment more involved than a cup of tea was roundly rejected. His routine was to use himself, run himself into the ground, allow Watson to ferry him off to the country for some interval of convalescence, then return to work and do it again. It was, in truth, the hardest part of loving him. 

But Watson had been a doctor for too long to ignore the way this cough rattled deep in Holmes’s chest, the way it choked him until his face was red and his eyes ran with tears. He was short of breath, but there was a notable lack of nasal congestion. The rare times he’d gotten Holmes to speak to him over the past few days, his voice was hoarse and frail, and he was only getting worse.

“Watson,” Holmes said to him one afternoon, carpetbag in hand, “I’m afraid my recent business has called me away, I don’t know for how long.”

Watson frowned. “You’re not well, Holmes,” he said. “I insist you rest. As your doctor--”

“It’s quite urgent, I--”

“As your friend, then,” Watson interrupted, unable to keep the desperation from his tone. “Please.”

He held Holmes’s gaze defiantly for several long seconds before tearing away. When he spoke again, it was nearly a whisper. “You frighten me,” he said. “I only want to help you.”

“Oh, my dear friend,” said Holmes, his expression sobering. “I promise when I return, I’ll let you look at me. Forgive me, Watson, I never meant to worry you so.” 

He held a hand out to Watson for a shake. It was unusual, Watson noted; even on his longer trips he tended to leave without much fanfare. His goodbyes looked like a flurry of clothes in a bag and instructions for what Watson was to do until he returned. The Holmes who stood before him was calm, focused. Watson gripped his hand and held it, feeling his hand gripped in return. It really was not much of a handshake at all. Watson stayed, reluctant to withdraw first, and realized at once that Holmes was just as hesitant. The moment stretched far beyond propriety, every second suspended between them in precarious silence.

Then it was over. Holmes dropped his hand, turned immediately away, picked up his bag, and was gone.

  
  


\----------

  
  


Three days at Baker Street without Holmes might have been pleasant under different circumstances. Of course he loved having Holmes there -- but, then, that was just it. He would have thought by that point he’d be used to the constant gnawing in the pit of his stomach day in and day out, that it would be second nature to hold his tongue, to stay his hand, but it felt more like keeping in a breath for far too long. Having the occasional day or two to exhale seemed to prevent him from… well, he wasn’t quite sure what. Tearing his hair out, falling into hysterics, saying something impossibly, irrevocably foolish.

But this particular absence was not the letup it should have been. Nothing about Holmes’s departure sat right with him, from the fact that he should have stayed home to try and recover, to the strangeness of their last moments together. 

Watson should have stopped him, asked questions, tried, at least, to get something out of him. Anything. Where was he going? What would he do when he arrived? What did he need to accomplish before he could come home? If Holmes hadn’t meant to worry him, why did it feel like he’d gone well out of his way to do just that?

The morning of the fourth day, Watson found himself staring at Holmes’s desk, absently chewing the tip of his thumb. 

Holmes valued his privacy, though in all the years of their friendship, he didn’t tend to keep secrets -- not for long, at any rate. Not from Watson. Anything he found here that might tell him about Holmes’s purported business away would only be what he’d hear directly from Holmes later. It was a violation, yes, but it was, perhaps, the only thing that stood a chance of quelling the havoc in Watson’s imagination and nerves alike. If Watson’s snooping upset Holmes, then that was a battle for the future. For now, he needed to know.

He nodded to himself as if granting his own permission, stepped forward, and opened the desk drawer. Toward the front were a pen, a notepad, some scraps of paper. His morocco case had been left behind; a good sign, Watson thought at the sight of it -- that meant he was indeed occupied. 

Then, pulling the drawer open a few inches further, he spotted the envelope. It was plain, with no postage, addressed simply to him. 

To John.

The sight of it stopped his heart. He looked down at it for seconds, hours, a millenia. If he shut the drawer, walked away, forgot about it, then maybe it would be for someone else. Another John, any number of Johns stumbling their way about London; some John who had never before discovered such a letter from Sherlock Holmes, who didn’t yet understand what it was to be haunted by ink on paper and find that he preferred it to the devastating stillness of solitude.

This letter could not have been for him, because Sherlock Holmes would not have left him another letter.

And yet, Holmes’s handwriting stared back at him. He took a shallow breath, reached to pick it up, turned it over and extracted the folded paper inside.

_My dearest Watson,_ it read--

_I know that I owe you much more than I can fit onto this sheet, or onto any number of sheets, with any number of words I might use to fill them. I certainly feel sometimes that I have quite enough to say. But I will be brief, knowing well that we’ve done this before. For that, and for so much else, I cannot expect your forgiveness. And yet it is my selfish hope that when this letter finds you, it might bring you more comfort than grief. Your friendship, your companionship, has been the brightest light I’ve known since our auspicious meeting so many years ago. I make no exaggeration to say that it quite literally saved my life. I have never deserved your kindness, though I know I took it as if I did. You are an easy man to love, dear Watson, and I thrill for the next soul who might get a glimpse of that light._

_I beg you to believe me when I say that I am sorry for the unhappiness I’ve caused you. I fear that you will try and blame yourself for any part of this, but please know this was my own doing. It has always been my own doing. I pray that when you remember me, when you look back at the stories you’ve written, it will be fondly. I will understand if it is not._

_Whatever happens, and whatever you may come to think of me, know that I am and always will be_

_Yours,_

_Sherlock Holmes_

Watson fell into the desk chair, his knees no longer agreeing to support him. The paper shook in his hands, unreadable, even if his vision were not blurred. 

Somewhere downstairs, Mrs. Hudson ran the tap and stacked dishes. Outside, a man shouted for a cab. And in Watson’s head, silence. Oppressive, paralyzing silence.

He thought of a cigarette case, delicately etched with floral motifs, polished silver reflecting the sunlight, elegant and personal, reduced to a simple paperweight. 

_Again,_ he thought, a single word rising up through the watery white noise. He turned his eyes upon the desk, but there were no footprints, no details, no out of place peculiarities to offer a ghost of a clue as to why this was happening. 

_Again_. 

Even if there had been something, some hint Holmes had left to point him in the direction of God knows what, any shred of stamina he may have had to interpret it was gone altogether. 

There was only this letter -- that alone hardly made sense as it was.

No, if he wanted information, if there was information to be had at all, there was only one other person on this Earth who might have it. Watson closed his eyes and inhaled, drawing in the strength to push himself to his feet again. He tucked the letter carefully into his breast pocket and carried himself to the door, down the stairs, out onto Baker Street, his thoughts trailing somewhere just behind him as if they were not his own. _Again_ , he heard them echo as he climbed into a cab. 

Maybe this was what he deserved for so many years of carrying this unyielding secret affection, for never speaking it aloud, perhaps for possessing it at all. Maybe it was a consequence of ingratitude for the miracle of Holmes’s resurrection, for believing in the safety of some perceived improbability that this could recur, as if death could be quantified and anticipated to any calculable degree. Or maybe Watson had simply failed him, as a friend, that after all this time Holmes still could not trust him. 

Perhaps he himself did not merit another second chance, Watson decided, but Sherlock Holmes must. If grace saw fit to bestow another miracle, if he dared to hope for such a thing, this time, he would not waste it. 

This time, he would get it right.

  
  


\----------

  
  


Standing in the foyer in wait for Mycroft Holmes, Watson tried to bring himself to a center. He clutched the envelope and set his focus on steadying his hand, on deciding what to say and how to say it without completely losing his grip. Should he have been angry, assuming that Mycroft knew of this and said nothing? Did Mycroft owe him that at all? 

The door of Mycroft’s office opened, and Watson prepared himself to speak.

“Ah, Doctor,” Mycroft spoke first. “I’m glad you’re here.”

Watson frowned. It was, as far as he knew the man, rather unlike Mycroft to be glad to receive anyone.

“It’s Sherlock,” Watson finally managed, gesturing weakly with the envelope. “He--”

“Yes, indeed,” said Mycroft with a sigh. “It’s all rather macabre.” 

Watson opened his mouth to protest, but was again interrupted. 

“I was just going to send for you if you hadn’t come.” Mycroft fished in his breast pocket and withdrew a slip of paper. “You will find my brother at this address,” he said.

“He’s alive?” said Watson, barely hearing his own voice. His head swam as he accepted the note with numb fingers.

“For the time being,” Mycroft replied. “I would kindly ask you not to delay your visit, though.”

Watson shook his head, forcing his thoughts into order. 

“What happened to him?” he said, trying and failing to cover his frustration. “How can you stay here when you know he needs help? Why did you wait so long to tell me?”

“Because, dear doctor, there is nothing for me to do,” said Mycroft, his manner stiffening and his tongue turning severe. “You are what he needs; I’m sure he and I would both be obliged if you’d accommodate him.”

It clarified nothing, but the finality of it drew the exchange to an abrupt close.

“Yes, of course,” Watson said. “...Thank you.”

Mycroft raised a brow, studying Watson’s face for a moment. 

“I hope I will have reason to thank you,” he said. “Good luck.”

  
  


\----------

  
  


The trip to Kent was excruciating, between the train, the cab ride and the incessant stream of hypotheticals through which Watson found himself wading. 

Had Holmes been blackmailed? After confronting so many of such fiends, it seemed inconceivable that he would have ever bent to one, let alone to such an extreme. It must be related to his illness; but why, then, would he prefer to suffer with it, to let it _kill_ him, rather than ask for help? Surely his pride was not so insurmountable that he wouldn’t at least have requested a different doctor, since for some inscrutable reason he refused help from his friend.

Either way, all evidence suggested he’d readily accepted this fate, if not chosen it willingly. The idea of it burned in Watson’s chest; of all the selfish, careless--

The dog cart drew to a halt outside of a stone cottage facing the sea. It was the sort of place to which Watson had dragged Holmes on the rare occasions Holmes would permit such a thing, except that it was removed from the nearest town to an altogether impractical degree. This was not a place of peaceful respite for convalescence -- this was isolation. 

Watson drew in a breath and collected his bag, stepping out of the cart with a brief nod to send the driver off. The sun drifted low behind him, the breeze masking the sound of distant waves. The scene was charming, and it threw his own disquietude into ugly, sharp relief. This was what Holmes meant, he supposed, when he suggested the country was predisposed to harboring terrible secrets. Fitting, then, that it was where he’d brought his own.

If there were any words Watson had prepared, any speeches he thought he might righteously deliver, they abandoned him completely upon stepping up to the front door. From the other side, he could hear a racking, violent cough, choking and gasping shallowly. The sound of it turned Watson’s blood cold, and he pushed through the unlatched door without another thought.

The first thing to greet him was a floor covered in bruised and macerated leaves and petals, as if someone had bedecked the cottage with roses and then trampled them without a care. Watson felt the petals compress beneath the soles of his shoes with every step, as leaves and petals became blossoms and thorny stems which all but entirely obscured the wooden slats beneath them.

The individual pieces of the scene came together in a way that pitted Watson’s medical expertise against his equally practiced knowledge of Holmes. It hardly seemed possible; Holmes had never spoken of anyone, ever. Had he? Or had he mentioned someone in passing, and Watson simply failed to take note? Perhaps it wasn’t Holmes he would find here at all, and this wreckage belonged to someone else entirely. 

It couldn’t be Holmes. 

But the scene coalesced in a single moment of perfect, sickening clarity as he set his eyes at last on his friend.

There on the floor by the far wall, Holmes braced himself on hands and knees, fighting for every shallow breath. And yet, in spite of his condition, Holmes appeared as polished as Watson had ever seen him: fine suit, shoes brushed, hair only just on the other side of neat.

“Holmes--” Watson began, and was cut off by another relentless, rasping spell as Holmes retched up another rose to join the rest. 

Watson knelt beside him to place a soothing hand on his back, and only then did Holmes seem to realize he was there at all. He startled, fighting to compose himself even as strained tears escaped him. 

“John,” he said, falling back against the wall with a bitter huff of a laugh. He drew his knees to his chest and closed his eyes, twisting the stem of a surprisingly intact rose between his fingers.

“What have you done?” Watson managed at last, his gut wrenching at the futility of the question. The flowering cough, or _hanahaki_ , had but one known origin -- it all at once made absolute sense why he’d been reluctant to discuss it, why, in his dogmatic devotion to logic, he had decided not to trouble anyone with it, when it had no remedy.

But it _did._

“You should have told me,” Watson tried again, having received no response. “I could have helped you, I could have tried.”

“Oh, my Watson,” sighed Holmes, his voice coarse and shaken. He held the rose up, examining it, a scarlet wound on its barbed stalk. He smiled. “Still beautiful, isn’t it?”

“Tell me who,” pressed Watson. “There’s time yet, I can--”

“You can what? Fetch my would-be lover, convince them to have a change of heart here in the middle of this--” His protest was stopped short by a fresh surge of petals, spit crudely onto the floor beside him.

Watson reached for Holmes’s hand before he could think better of it. 

“If you have ever thought of me as a friend, I beg you to tell me. Let me try to help,” he pleaded. 

Somewhere, someone walked the streets with Holmes’s heart in pocket; it didn’t matter that it wasn’t Watson. It didn’t matter that Holmes had not trusted him with the name already. If someone had Holmes’s heart, Watson would find them. He would fix this.

“I cannot sit back and watch you-- watch… this,” he said. “Please. Don’t force me to live with that.”

The hand which held the rose dropped it in favor of covering Watson’s. Holmes clutched his hand tightly for a moment, two, three moments, before withdrawing again.

“I would not wish for you to live with anything so regrettable, my dear boy,” he said, keeping his eyes fixed on the opposite wall, “but you put me in an impossible position. You should not have come.”

“You should not have left!” Watson snapped. “You should never have left! You should have trusted me! What have I ever done to make you feel you need to do so much alone? After everything, _everything_ we’ve done together, how can you think for a moment that I would not do anything to help you, to protect you? How can you think that I don’t need you?”

The crease between Holmes’s brows deepened as he closed his eyes again, breathing in quiet, shallow gasps.

“Tell me who,” Watson repeated firmly.

Holmes brought a hand to his face, covering his eyes before exhaling and meeting Watson’s stare. 

“John,” he said, a wistful smile ghosting his lips. “Who else?”

The question rang in Watson’s ears as Holmes gave himself again to a fit of strangled hacking.

The implication was clear, but it seemed impossible nonetheless. Not because he thought Holmes couldn’t love -- nothing as unkind as that -- nor even because he thought Holmes couldn’t love him, specifically, although the revelation sent Watson’s heart climbing into his throat. No, it seemed impossible for the sole reason that this disease required the exact psychological conditions of absolute despair. 

It required that Holmes believe there was no possibility of any returned affection whatever. It required that he believe that was something Watson could never do. 

And _that_ was impossible. It had to be.

Holmes rested again on the wall, his staccato breaths punctuating the silence between them.

“You think I don’t… love you?” Watson said at last, but the words were stilted and rigid. If that was the root of this, he had to do better.

“Oh, Watson, please,” replied Holmes, exasperated. “Don’t insult me. You love me, yes. You love me as you might love a brother, as an old friend. You love me because that is who you are. Knowing that love has been the greatest--” Another cough interrupted him, another flower pulled from his throat and tossed to the floor. He leaned back and sighed. “It is enough, John. It’s enough.”

“It isn’t,” said Watson. “Not here. And moreover, it’s not true.” He could feel the heat rising up to his ears as his tone shifted into something furiously desperate. “You’re mad -- you’re _blind_ if you think I don’t love you. I should have had the nerve to tell you, and for that I will never be sorry enough. I was afraid. I invented a thousand reasons to keep it secret, that you’d find it distracting or distasteful or unnecessary, that you would never think of me the same again. But they were groundless, all of them. And so is this. Holmes--” Watson caught him by the wrist, demanding his attention. Holmes met his eyes only for a moment, something unnervingly resembling fear crossing his expression before he turned away again.

“You once told me it was a mistake to form an opinion without the evidence to support it,” Watson implored. “What evidence do you have? How can you presume to know what I do or do not feel?”

“You don’t love me,” Holmes said, holding his gaze at last. The corners of his mouth turned up in his familiar, affectionate half smile, as if reminding Watson of something he should have well known by now. “You are a doctor,” he explained, “trying in vain to save his patient. You are a friend, an excellent friend, trying to spare his companion a dire fate, by any means necessary.” He placed a shaky hand on top of Watson’s, letting his head fall back to the wall. “But you do not love me.”

Watson felt his patience crack, a white hot ire that prickled his skin. 

“Damn it all, Holmes!” he swore at the ceiling.

“You’re angry because I’m right,” said Holmes.

“I’m angry because you’re a stubborn fool!” Watson shouted. “I’m angry because you’d sooner die than take my word! What’s so unimaginable about being in love with you? Why is that so impossible to believe?”

“Because you can’t be!” Holmes retorted, his rasping voice straining for volume. He coughed, spitting up a handful of petals. “You cannot love me, my dear Watson,” he continued after a ragged breath, “for the simple reason that there is nothing to love.”

Watson opened his mouth to protest, but was not given the chance.

“I have given you nothing,” Holmes said. “There is nothing to give.” His tone became once more collected and measured, his manner returning to something resolutely withdrawn. “You deserve a happy life with someone who can freely offer all those gentle, picturesque things. That is not my love.”

Watson drew his brows together in disbelief, searching Holmes’s face for some hint of irony, finding only the dark circles and deepening lines of a hopelessly tired man. 

“That has never been what I wanted, Sherlock Holmes, and you know it,” he said, quieting to match Holmes. “There is not a single truth in anything you’ve said. If you’ve loved me as much as all this,” he gestured emphatically to the scatterings on the floor, “then _that_ is what you have to give. _That_ is what I want. That’s all I’ve ever wanted.”

“No,” Holmes shook his head, squeezing his eyes shut. “You aren’t listening.”

“I hear you quite clearly,” Watson laughed bitterly. “ _Fifteen years_ I’ve spent by your side, and you think I need to pretend to understand you? When you left the last time, I felt my soul torn in half. I felt dismembered, limping through my days like an amputee, thinking I’d never be whole again. That is what you are to me, Sherlock. I have _never_ wanted a promise of ease or safety, and if you think otherwise then you’ve never known me at all.”

He stared at Holmes for several long seconds, yet no argument came. 

“But you do know me,” Watson said quietly, an unexpected rise of emotion stinging at his eyes. “Better than anyone. Better than anyone I’ve ever known or will know again. I don’t _want_ anyone else to know me as you do. I want you to come home, and I want you to stay, and if you cannot stay then I want to leave with you. But you must believe me.”

A fierce, heaving fit sent Holmes forward again to his knees, and he pulled out three roses on their thorny stems, one after the other, unable to stifle the pained sob which followed. He spit blood as Watson caressed his back, and with his other hand on his chest, eased him again to sitting. Holmes clung to his fingers, and Watson couldn’t determine if the tears were from the force of his coughing spell or from his own grief.

“I love you,” Watson whispered, feeling Holmes’s overtaxed heartbeat under his palm. “I love you. There is nothing else to say. Tell me what you need to hear; ask me how I knew I loved you; ask me how long I’ve watched you play your violin or measure a chemical or sift through papers and wanted nothing more than to hold your hands, to feel your fingers between my own. Ask me to kiss you now and I shall do it; it’s one more thing I should have done already. I’ll tell you anything. There is nothing I will reserve if it means you’ll believe me. But you cannot be so committed to this abject portrait of yourself that you would abandon me again.”

Holmes turned sharply to look at him, silver eyes pained in a different, deeper way. 

“I knew when we met that I would love you,” he said, watching Watson’s face with the same scrutiny he applied to clients who thought to deceive him. “If I had listened to myself I would have turned you away, and you would have been the better for it. What good have I brought you that has not been thoroughly undone by misery? Even now, this very conversation stamps out the warmth of some happier memory. I have no wish to abandon you--”

“Then don’t,” said Watson, pulling Holmes’s hand close. He pressed Holmes’s knuckles to his lips, his forehead, blinking tears away. “Don’t.”

Holmes shifted toward him, taking his hand back to tip Watson’s face up by his chin, to brush a thumb against his cheek. 

“I don’t know how,” he said. “I fear it’s already too late.”

“No,” Watson said resolutely. “No. I cannot lie to you Holmes, I’ve never been able to, even if I wanted to. Look at me now and you’ll see I’m telling the truth. I love you. It’s a simple fact. It’s as uncomplicated as… as tobacco ash, or bicycle tires, and if you find those things more complicated than I credit them for, I invite you to study it just as completely. You may study it for a lifetime, if it pleases you, if it draws you out of this godforsaken place. Let me bring you home and you may test me to your heart’s content, but your findings will never refute what I’ve told you here.” 

He reached out, taking a fistful of Holmes’s shirt, anchoring him to his spot as though without a hand on him he might disappear. 

“Even if you truly cannot believe it,” said Watson, “I would ask at least that you not deny it.”

“I do not deny that you think you love me--”

“No,” said Watson again. “If you’re going to force me to leave here alone, then you owe it to me to hear you say it. If you’re going to force me to live the rest of my life without you, it will be with the knowledge that you spoke the words, even if it was only once.”

Holmes looked at him as if he’d been wounded, or perhaps as if he expected to be. 

"John--” he said, dropping his fingers from Watson’s face.

Watson released Holmes’s shirt to take up both of his hands. 

“Tell me that I love you,” he said, “and I’ll let this… be done.”

He wrested the words from himself like an arrow from his chest; if this was really such an exercise in futility, he would not spend the remainder of their time in argument. But he had to try, once more.

It was Holmes, now, who pressed a lingering kiss to the knuckles of Watson’s right hand, then his left. He offered a weak smile and opened his mouth to speak, but his voice caught and his expression turned contemplative. He closed his eyes and inhaled, deeply.

When he opened them again, the smile he offered was broader, genuine.

“You... love me,” he said, tentative in spite of his newfound calm.

Something had happened which Watson could not follow, but he’d never been able to hold to stoicism when Holmes smiled. 

“Yes,” he nodded, his own expression lightening. “Yes, I love you.”

“You love me,” Holmes echoed. “Watson, I can breathe.” He inhaled again to demonstrate, breaking into a rasping laugh. “You love me. _You love me_.”

Relief struck Watson with dizzying force as the meaning of it set in. He could not pinpoint exactly where, in the last several minutes, Holmes had stopped his intermittent coughing fits, but it hardly mattered. Something Watson said had worked. He sank back against the wall and covered his face with a hand, his own laugh joining Holmes.

When he looked at Holmes again, it was as though his every thought was there, written plainly on his face. Relief, yes, but also joy, affection, a tinge of regret, as freely displayed as he was ever wont to do, done so because he wanted Watson to see it, the wire reconnected.

Holmes moved to cradle his cheek, and Watson leaned into it, letting his eyes fall shut. 

“You said--” Holmes started, but paused to better collect his focus. 

Watson opened his eyes, the sincerity of Holmes’s expression hitting him again in a way that made his heart burst into a million fluttering fragments.

“You said,” Holmes began again, “that I may ask you to kiss me. If the offer stands, I--”

The thought had barely been spoken when Watson buried his fingers again in Holmes’s shirt and pulled him close. He hesitated, inches from Holmes’s lips, and shut his eyes against the warmth of his breath, the brush of their noses. 

It was Holmes who closed the distance, cradling Watson’s cheek as he kissed him, gentle and sweet, then kissed him again, and again, and once more still, until Watson swore he could taste his smile.

When Holmes finally drew back, he pressed their foreheads together with a contented sigh. Watson threaded his fingers between Holmes’s as they separated and sat back, side by side against the wall. Holmes’s breathing came slowly, evenly, and he closed his eyes for the first peaceful moment he must have had in weeks. 

He felt raw and depleted himself, but Watson willed the tension in his shoulders away, letting his focus settle on their intertwined hands. He looked out over the rest of the room, taking it in as he realized he hadn’t done since he arrived. This was, it seemed, what another miracle looked like: a too-small cottage with floorboards covered in mutilated petals, the sharp smell of roses and blood lingering in the stagnant air, and Sherlock Holmes beside him, alive, breathing. It looked like their palms pressed together; it looked like the kiss he never dreamt they would share. They’d both been given this second second chance -- for his part, Watson decided, he intended to spend every moment of it demonstrating exactly how much Holmes was loved. If the struggle to convince him he could be loved at all was any indication, it would be an undertaking. But, Watson thought with a small smile, there were certainly far worse ways to spend a lifetime.

Watson’s attention was pulled back to the present as he realized Holmes had been watching him for some time. He turned to meet his eyes and felt his heart skip at the uncharacteristic tenderness in Holmes’s face. But no, he thought -- it wasn’t uncharacteristic at all. He’d seen it before, any number of times, only then he hadn’t known what it was.

Holmes drew a quick breath as if to speak, but his lips sealed again and his brow creased. He shifted to better face Watson, tugging their hands closer to himself and giving a sincere squeeze.

“I love you, John Watson,” he said.

Watson broke into an uninhibited grin, a fresh swell of affection threatening more tears.

“I think I bloody well know that by now,” he laughed, and pulled Holmes in for another kiss.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AND AGAIN endless eternal thanks to Solshine for betaing 🙌

**Author's Note:**

> A MILLION BILLION thanks as usual to Solshine for the summary and for betaing and generally being great 👌


End file.
